Ranking the Films of the Mission: Impossible Series

It’s easy to forget that Mission: Impossible was originally conceived as a nineties nostalgia-television adaptation, as it has so thoroughly transcended the pop culture matrix that birthed it to become one of the premiere action series of the 21st century. Right from the start of the first film, cinematic provocateur Brian De Palma tears apart the original series, stripping it down in a bravura opening act that splits apart the team and the concept of the show, leaving the viewer with what has become the series indelible and lasting icon: Tom Cruise’s Ethan Hunt, a man who in a later film is described as “the Living Manifestation of Destiny.” A spy who rivals James Bond with his gadgets, daring, and the stakes of his missions, should he choose to accept them.

The seventh film in the series, Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One, promises at least one more mission for Ethan Hunt and his IMF, the Impossible Mission Force (in this latest entry we finally get an International Monetary Fund joke). In the time since 1996, Tom Cruise has gone from matinee-idol leading man to controversial superstar to elder statesmen of cinema, building and rebuilding the brand of the series as much upon his own image as the last remaining Hollywood movie star—a man dedicated to real stunt work and old fashioned movie magic—as the series’ own internal mythos.

So, having rewatched the whole series this spring and summer in the run up to Dead Reckoning Part One, I thought I’d offer a ranking of the series. What does each film bring to the table, and where does my perception of the series sit at this juncture in cinema history?

Mission: Impossible (1996) dir. Brian De Palma

For me, not only does the original film still rank highest in my mind, it has grown in my esteem since the summer of 1996. Appropriately, given De Palma’s touch, it is a paranoid and convoluted Hitchockian “wrong man” tale, which resets the premise of the original television series for cinema and establishes Tom Cruise’s Ethan Hunt as the series protagonist. Some fans of the original series (including original star Peter Graves) hated the film’s deployment of Jon Voight as TV series lead, Jim Phelps, but there’s no doubting that the twist in De Palma’s film is effective. De Palma’s film takes advantage of its post-Cold War setting, with the intelligence agencies who once fought the war reduced to competition with rivals and arms dealers they once opposed. In this it shares something with other nineties spy films such as GoldenEye or Ronin. Ultimately, it is Hunt, and specifically Tom Cruise’s portrayal of him, that stands out, his confidence and charm getting him out of plenty of tight spots, with a wiry athleticism and boyish grin the whole time. The Langley heist is rightfully the film’s central set-piece highlight that offers a giddy thrill in its execution and its use of humour. But while later entries up the ante on the action and set pieces, the first film remains the most atmospheric and delivers wonderfully on its highwire act. De Palma’s camera is perfectly used to show and withhold key information in the film, at times bordering on confusing, but on repeated viewing revealing itself to be a rare blockbuster that respects its audience’s intelligence and ability to engage with a true spy thriller.

2. Mission: Impossible – Fallout (2018) dir. Christopher McQuarrie

Fallout is the culmination of the reorientation of the series that Tom Cruise and writer and director Christopher McQuarrie have executed since the more muted reception to the third film in the series. Where this film shines is in bringing together the character pieces that have been woven into the series, from Simon Pegg’s Benji and Ving Rhames’ Luther to Rebecca Fergeson’s Ilsa Faust and Sean Harris’s archvillain, Solomon Lane, with the action and stunt-work that fans have come to expect from the series. Fallout is perhaps the most like the original film in its twists and tone, playing like a true spy thriller. It also provides Ethan Hunt with one of his most memorable antagonists in August Walker a.k.a. John Lark, played by Superman himself, Henry Cavill. Cavill is a physical match for Cruise’s Hunt, and his character is another example of the twists and turns the series has dealt in from the start. Fallout’s action is top notch. Its pace is quick and the set pieces, particularly the HALO jump into Paris and a final battle between helicopters in the Kashmiri Himalayas, are fantastic. Finally, it manages to close the loop on some of the missteps, addressed below, that the series had taken in a couple places, wrapping them up in solid fashion without further ado.

3. Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation (2016) dir. Christopher McQuarrie

Swap Rogue Nation and Fallout if you prefer; it’s mostly a matter of personal preference. But these two McQuarrie-directed films are examples of Cruise and company hitting their stride and realizing what works in these films. Rogue Nation stands out for offering the best female lead the series has had in Rebecca Ferguson’s Ilsa Faust. Ilsa is suitably mysterious and a match for Hunt when she needs to be. This film has plenty of great action, but also glamour and Hitchcockian suspense, especially in the film’s set piece at the Vienna State Opera that recalls elements of Hitchcock’s The Man Who Knew Too Much and even a similar sequence in the James Bond 007 film, Quantum of Solace. This is the film where Hunt manages to possibly even out-do James Bond himself, getting his own version of SPECTRE in the mysterious Syndicate alluded to in the film’s subtitle. Sean Harris’s Solomon Lane is particularly creepy and sinister, offering the series a quality villain and the plot to go with him, as he attempts to take down the governments of the world.

4. Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol (2011) dir. Brad Bird

Ghost Protocol was where Cruise and company rejigged the series to make it more streamlined and coherent after J.J. Abrams’ third film. It brings back characters from that film who would become core to the series and offers them more to do, particularly Simon Pegg’s Benji, and offers an emphasis on spy team dynamics and outlandish stunts, with a sequence set at Dubai’s Burj Khalifa operating as both a throwback to the “Langley Heist” of the first film and establishing Tom Cruise doing death-defying stunt work as one of the series’ key draws. The titular “Ghost Protocol” leaves Ethan Hunt and his team on their own and isolated, “going rogue” to save the world from terrorists who want to start a thermonuclear war between Russia and the US. In pivoting from the supposedly more gritty and “personal” stakes of Abrams’ third entry, Brad Bird, directing his first live-action film, shows a strong command of action cinema structure and execution. While it’s clear that the filmmakers included Jeremy Renner’s Brandt as a potential series lead should the film have under-performed, Ghost Protocol was perhaps as much about rebranding Tom Cruise himself as it was the series, and returning him to the A-list after a half-decade of jokes and controversies. It would become the highest grossing film in the series when it debuted.

5. Mission: Impossible II (2000) dir. John Woo

Here’s my most controversial Mission: Impossible opinion: John Woo’s much-maligned sequel to the Brian De Palma original is actually a very good action movie and not the worst film in the Mission: Impossible series. After the first film, directed by one of the New Hollywood “Movie Brat” auteurs, it made sense to go after another director with a strong stylistic signature and auteur status, in this case Hong Kong master John Woo. When viewed from the vantage that the most important thing in a series is continuity and a sense of familiarity, one can see why some might not enjoy Woo’s entry in the series and how it departs from the structure and tone of the other films. But viewed as a melodramatic and operatic Hong Kong action film, albeit in English, M:I-2 is a great entry that goes big in emotional beats and action scenes. The film marries many of Woo’s signature elements, including dual-wielded pistols and doves, to the outline of Notorious (legendary screenwriter Robert Towne admits he borrowed the plot of Hitchcock’s film with the hero falling in love with the heroine, only to send her back to her ex-lover to spy on him). Plus, the whole deadly virus villainous plot hits even harder today in a post-Covid world. It may not fit neatly into where Cruise and McQuarrie have taken the series, but Mission: Impossible II is still well-worth the time of any action film fan.

6. Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One (2023) dir. Christopher McQuarrie

It might very well be that after part two in 2024 I’ll rate this one higher, but despite its continuation of what McQuarrie and Cruise have accomplished with the fifth and sixth films in the series I felt a touch of diminishing returns with the seventh film. Part of it is that, at two hours and 43 minutes, it’s just too long, especially for a film that bills itself as part one of a story. Thankfully, Dead Reckoning Part One resolves the hunt for its central McGuffin in the cruciform key, so it’s not a total cliff-hanger. That said, the tendency of these kinds of blockbuster films to become ungainly as they get bigger and bigger rears its head here. But Dead Reckoning Part One is still a great action film in an era when such stunt work and dedication to the craft of the action scene is still the exception rather than the rule. It has at least two great action scenes, a car chase in Rome and a train sequence in the Alps, and its plot, involving a mysterious AI that has all the world's governmental and non-governmental forces racing for control, definitely feels perfect for this moment in time. Unfortunately, in addition to being too long, Esai Morales, as the mysterious villain, Gabriel, simply lacks the star power for the role they’re asking him to play. The film needed someone who could credibly go toe-to-toe with Cruise.

7. Mission: Impossible III (2006) dir. J.J. Abrams

It’s easy to pick on J.J. and critical consensus seems to be coming around to the fact that this is the worst film in the series, but let us not forget that upon its release many critics hailed it as the franchise’s best (it has the highest Tomatometer ranking out of the first three films). What Abrams attempts to do is ground the film in a more realistic spy-thriller world, and make the stakes personal by introducing a now married Ethan Hunt, working in training for the IMF and keeping his wife in the dark about his past. This is the first major misstep in my mind, which later films would have to go out of their way to resolve. It handicaps the series by making it harder to generate any kind of romantic tension in these films, at least until Rebecca Ferguson shows up. But this was seen as a course correction for the excesses and romanticism of Woo’s second entry. But in retrospect, Abrams’ film introduces more problems than it solves (which has become something of a pattern in the filmmaker's work). The third Mission: Impossible is hardly a bad film. It greatly benefits from the terrifying villain performance of the late Philip Seymour Hoffman, though it doesn’t give him much to do. But it is definitely tied closely to the styles of the era, drawing on contemporaneous TV shows like 24 and Abrams’ own Alias, which is oddly fitting for a series based on a television show, It lacks either the panache of De Palma’s film or the over-the-top energy of Woo’s film, and when the franchise finally did find its stride and purpose as a series—rather than as a set of individual auteur entries—this film seems in retrospect more like a detour and irritant than a proper table-setting.

Mission: Impossible (1996, USA)

Directed by Brian De Palma; screenplay by David Koepp and Robert Towne from a story by David Koepp and Steven Zaillian, based on the television series created by Bruce Geller; starring Tom Cruise, Ving Rhames, Jon Voight, Emmanuelle Béart, Henry Czerny, Jean Reno, Kristen Scott Thomas, Vanessa Redgrave, Emilio Estevez.

Mission: Impossible II (2000, USA/Germany)

Directed by John Woo; screenplay by Robert Towne from a story by Ronald D. Moore & Brannon Braga, based on the television series created by Bruce Geller; starring Tom Cruise, Thandie Newton, Dougray Scott, Ving Rhames, Richard Roxburgh, Radé Sherbedgia, Brendan Gleeson, Anthony Hopkins.

Mission: Impossible III (2006, USA)

Directed by J.J. Abrams; written by Alex Kurtzman & Roberto Orci & J.J. Abrams, based on the television series created by Bruce Geller; starring Tom Cruise, Phillip Seymour Hoffman, Ving Rhames, Billy Crudup, Michelle Monaghan, Jonathan Rhys Meyers, Maggie Q, Simon Pegg, Eddie Marsan, Laurence Fishburne.

Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol (2011, USA)

Directed by Brad Bird; written by Josh Appelbaum & André Nemec, based on the television series created by Bruce Geller; starring Tom Cruise, Paula Patton, Simon Pegg, Jeremy Renner, Michael Nyqvist, Léa Seydoux.

Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation (2015, USA)

Directed by Christopher McQuarrie; screenplay by Christopher McQuarrie from a story by Christopher McQuarrie and Drew Pearce, based on the television series created by Bruce Geller; starring Tom Cruise, Rebecca Ferguson, Ving Rhames, Simon Pegg, Jeremy Renner, Sean Harris, Simon McBurney, Tom Hollander, Alec Baldwin.

Mission: Impossible – Fallout (2018, USA)

Directed by Christopher McQuarrie; written by Christopher McQuarrie, based on the television series created by Bruce Geller; starring Tom Cruise, Rebecca Ferguson, Henry Cavill, Simon Pegg, Ving Rhames, Sean Harris, Angela Bassett, Alec Baldwin, Vanessa Kirby, Michelle Monaghan, Wes Bentley.

Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One (2023, USA)

Directed by Christopher McQuarrie; written by Christopher McQuarrie & Erik Jendresen, based on the television series created by Bruce Geller; starring Tom Cruise, Hayley Atwell, Ving Rhames, Simon Pegg, Rebecca Ferguson, Vanessa Kirby, Esai Morales, Pom Klementieff, Henry Czerny, Shea Whigham.